Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World (30 page)

1.
For text, translation, and details see G. Betegh,
The Derveni Papyrus: Cosmology, Theology and Interpretation
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). For more discussion see A. Laks and G. Most (eds.),
Studies on the Derveni Papyrus
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997). Orphism: Betegh,
Derveni Papyrus,
68–73 (cautiously). The Orphic texts were certainly not scripture in the Abrahamic sense: see R. G. Edmonds III,
Redefining Ancient Orphism: A Study in Greek Religion
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 95–138. Note also that the so-called Getty Hexameters, an “Orphic” poem from late fifth-century BC Selinous (in Sicily), have a reference to “lawless houses” (22), which may denote those outwith the religious group. For text, translation, and essays see C. A. Faraone and D. Obbink (eds.),
The Getty Hexameters: Poetry, Magic, and Mystery in Ancient Selinous
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).

2.
My translation follows the text of Betegh,
The Derveni Papyrus.

3.
Homer does know the expression “This did not happen without a god [
atheei
]” (
Odyssey
18.353), but otherwise the earliest usages I can find are in the fifth-century BC authors Aeschylus (
Eumenides
540,
Bacchylides
11.109) and Pindar (
Pythian Odes
4.162), where it means in effect “accursed.” Crescendo: Gorgias,
Palamedes
36; Euripides,
Bacchae
995, 1015,
Andromache
491,
Helen
1148 (compare
The Madness of Hercules
433). The adverb is always used in conjunction with another negative in early Greek: see Antiphon,
Against the Stepmother
21, 23,
Tetralogy
1; Plato,
Gorgias
481a, 523b. Socrates: Plato,
Apology
26c. Cyclopes: Homer,
Odyssey
9.106–8. “Surnamed” (
epikl
ē
theis
or similar) the
atheos:
Hippo
testimonia
8, 9 in H. Diels and W. Kranz,
Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker
, 6th ed. (Berlin: Weidmann, 1951); Diagoras: testimonia 6A, 9B, 17, 53, etc., in M. Winiarczyk,
Diagorae Melii et Theodori Cyrenaei reliquiae
(Leipzig: Teubner, 1981); Theodorus: 1A, B, C, 17, 26B in Winiarczyk.

4.
I follow here the developmental account of
asebeia
given by M. Ostwald,
From Popular Sovereignty to the Sovereignty of Law: Law, Society and Politics in Fifth-Century Athens
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986), 528–36, although there is much that remains uncertain. The idea that Diopeithes’s decree transformed the meaning of the terms also underlies E. Derenne,
Les procès d’impiété intentés aux philosophes à Athènes au Vme et au IVme siècles avant J.-C.
(Liège: Vaillant-Carmanne; Paris: Champion, 1930). For temple inscriptions relating to
asebeia
see A. Delli Pizzi, “Impiety in Epigraphic Evidence,”
Kernos
24 (2011): 59–76. For what we know of Diopeithes see M. Flower,
The Seer in Ancient Greece
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008), 124–25.
Asebeia
is first mentioned, to my knowledge, in the sixth century (Theognis 1180; Xenophanes fr. A14 in M. L. West,
Iambi et elegi Graeci,
vol. 2. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972).

5.
Decree: Plutarch,
Pericles
32.1. There are arguments against historicity in K. J. Dover, “The Freedom of the Intellectual in Greek Society,”
Talanta
7 (1976): 24–54; reprinted in
The Greeks and Their Legacy:
Collected Papers,
vol. 2:
Prose Literature, History, Society, Transmission, Influence
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1988), 135–58, 138–41, but the evidence for both decree and trial is exhaustively sifted by J. Mansfeld, “The Chronology of Anaxagoras’ Athenian Period and the Date of His Trial. Part II. The Plot Against Pericles and His Associates,”
Mnemosyne
33 (1980): 17–95, who accepts both as historical (and dates the former to 438/7 BC and the latter to 437/6—rather earlier than most would). On
eisangelia
I follow M. H. Hansen,
Eisangelia: The Sovereignty of the People’s Court in Athens in the Fourth Century B.C. and the Impeachment of Generals and Politicians
(Odense: Odense University Press, 1975).

6.
On Plutarch’s use of Craterus of Macedon as a source see P. A. Stadter,
A Commentary on Plutarch’s Pericles
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989), lxix–lxx; and C. Higbie, “Craterus and the Use of Inscriptions in Ancient Scholarship,”
Transactions of the American Philological Association
129 (1999): 43–83.

7.
That
nomizein
the gods always (up until Plato) means “to venerate through ritual” is argued by M. Giordano-Zecharya, “As Socrates Shows, the Athenians Did Not Believe in Gods,”
Numen
52 (2005): 325–55; see, however, the criticisms of H. Versnel,
Coping with the Gods: Wayward Readings in Greek Theology
(Leiden: Brill, 2011), 554–59. The full range of meanings for classical times is surveyed by W. Fahr,
ΘΕΟΥΣ
ΝΟΜΙΖΕΙΝ
: Zum Problem der Anfänge des Atheismus bei den Griechen
(Hildesheim: Olms, 1969). See p. 166 for the evidence that the meaning “believing in the gods” goes back at least to the 420s. D. Cohen,
Law, Sexuality and Society: The Enforcement of Morals in Classical Athens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 211–13 argues that correct belief in the gods was a central part of Athenian conceptions of piety (but all of his evidence postdates the Diopeithes decree—in which, however, he does not believe).

8.
On the politicization of the courts, see R. Bauman,
Political Trials in Ancient Greece
(London: Routledge, 1990), who gives an instrumental role to the trials of Pericles and his circle (pp. 35–49). Bauman accepts as historical more of the later story tradition than many would.

9.
Aristotle,
Virtues and Vices
1251a. In my interpretation of the elasticity of
asebeia
I follow Cohen,
Law, Sexuality and Society,
203–217. For sensible, cautious, and succinct discussion see R. Parker, “Law and Religion,” in M. Gagarin and D. Cohen (eds.),
The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Law
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 65–68. Impious man accuses his father: Plato,
Euthyphro.
Demosthenes:
Against Meidias
51, 55.

10.
Delli Pizzi, “Impiety”: 4 notes the absence of mention of
asebeia
in relation to the Diopeithes decree. On the widespread political uses of
asebeia
see Bauman,
Political Trials
(index under
“asebeia”
and “impiety”), with the caveat I have mentioned. On drama see the previous chapter.

11.
Diogenes of Apollonia: see Diogenes Laertius,
Lives of the Eminent Philosophers
9.57, and Aelian,
Varied History
2.31 (testimonia 1 and 3 in H. Diels and W. Kranz,
Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker,
6th ed. [Berlin: Weidmann, 1952]). Protagoras: Aristotle fragment 67 Rose (prosecution), Timon of Phlius fragment 5 Diels and Diogenes Laertius 9.52 (book burning), Sextus Empiricus,
Against the Mathematicians
9.56 (prosecuted and escaped). Fourth-century trials: L.-L. O’Sullivan, “Athenian Impiety Trials in the Late Fourth Century B.C.,”
Classical Quarterly
47 (1997): 136–52. Derenne,
Les procès d’impiété
covers all of this material, albeit uncritically. R. Parker,
Athenian Religion: A History
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), 207–10, gives a levelheaded assessment of the evidence, on which I rest here. Further studies are cited by Delli Pizzi, “Impiety,” n. 3.

12.
Anaxagoras tried for
asebeia:
Diodorus of Sicily 12.39.2 (paraphrasing his fourth-century BC source, Ephorus), Diogenes Laertius 2.12 (prosecuted by Cleon, not Diopeithes), etc. Mansfeld, “Chronology,” 82–3, convincingly undermines arguments against the historicity of the trial and observes the Platonic allusion to it at
Apology
26d. Evidence for Diagoras of Melos: F. Jacoby,
Diagoras
ὁ
ἄθεος
(Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1959), 3–8; and especially M. Winiarczyk,
Diagorae Melii et Theodori Cyrenaei reliquiae.
Jacoby believes that Diagoras was exiled for his beliefs; Winiarczyk by contrast argues that he gained his reputation for atheism solely on the basis of the profanation of the mysteries (“Diagoras von Melos: Wahrheit und Legende [Fortsetzung],”
Eos
68 [1980]: 51–75). Atheism: testimonia 38–68 Winiarczyk. Aristoxenus: testimonium 69, with the interpretation of Decharme,
Les procès d’impiété,
61–62. An atheistic
Phrygian Discourse
is also attributed to Diagoras by a Christian writer, Tatian, but this is likely to have been in fact a Hellenistic text in the euhemerist tradition (J. Rives, “Phrygian tales,”
Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies
45 [2005]: 230–32). Conversion to atheism: testimonium 9B, 26; statue of Heracles: testimonia 6A and 27–33, 63; storm: testimonia 34–35B.

13.
On the events of 415 BC see W. D. Furley,
Andocides and the Herms: A Study of Crisis in Fifth-Century Athenian Religion
(London: Institute of Classical Studies, 1996). Names and number of those accused of impiety: Ostwald,
Popular Sovereignty,
537–50. Thucydides: 6.27–28, and see above, chapter 6. The
eisangelia
against Alcibiades is preserved at Plutarch,
Alcibiades
22 (no doubt via Craterus of Macedon or a similar source).

14.
Diogenes Laertius,
Lives of the Eminent Philosophers
2.97, 100. Trial of Theodorus: O’Sullivan, “Athenian Impiety Trials,” 142–46 (arguing, amongst other things, that there is some evidence for political manipulation here as well).

15.
On “reappropriation” of labels, connotative reassignment, and group formation see A. Galinsky et al., “The Reappropriation of Stigmatizing Labels: The Reciprocal Relationship Between Power and Self-Labeling,”
Psychological Science
24 no. 10 (2013): 2020–29. I wonder whether the (potentially) positive term
amakhos,
“impossible to fight against,” may have provided an implicit model for the positive, theomachic sense of
atheos.
“Atheist underground”: D. Sedley, “The Atheist Underground,” in V. Harte and M. Lane (eds.),
Politeia in Greek and Roman Philosophy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 329–48.

1.
For a history of the period, see for example P. Rhodes,
A History of the Classical Greek World, 478–323 BC
(Oxford: Blackwell, 2006), 257–72.

2.
Amnesty: C. Joyce, “The Athenian Amnesty and Scrutiny of 403,”
Classical Quarterly
58 (2008): 507–18. Leon of Salamis: Plato,
Apology
32c–d;
Letter
7 324d–325a. Association with the tyrants: Xenophon,
Memorabilia
1.2.12; Aeschines,
Against Timarchus
173 (and see T. Brickhouse and N. Smith,
Socrates on Trial
[Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989], 71–73). It has been long debated whether the title figure of Plato’s
Critias
is to be identified with the tyrant Critias, but nothing in the text rules out the association. On the details of the trial see Brickhouse and Smith,
Socrates on Trial;
R. Parker,
Athenian Religion
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 199–216. For a readable account of the death of Socrates and its significance see E. Wilson,
The Death of Socrates: Hero, Villain, Chatterbox, Saint
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007). Another entertaining account of Socrates is B. Hughes,
The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens and the Search for the Good Life
(New York: Knopf, 2011). More generally, see S. Ahbel-Rappe and R. Kamtekar (eds.),
A Companion to Socrates
(Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2006); and D. R. Morrison (ed.),
The Cambridge Companion to Socrates
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010).

3.
Formal charge: most fully at Diogenes Laertius 2.40; shorter versions at Plato,
Apology
24b and Xenophon,
Memorabilia of Socrates
1.1. Impiety: Plato,
Euthyphro
5c,
Apology
35d; Xenophon,
Apology
22, etc. Brickhouse and Smith,
Socrates on Trial,
33 misleadingly claim that the Diopeithes decree “was annulled…by the general amnesty of 403/2.” This confuses two things: the general amnesty issued to those involved with the Thirty (see previous note) and a separate attempt to streamline and rationalize the laws into a systematic code. As a result of the latter, “decrees” like those of Diopeithes were still recognized but seen as not necessarily eternal. See Rhodes,
History of the Classical Greek World,
260–62. Little is known, however, about this streamlining attempt, and its effects were impermanent (see, for example, A. Lanni,
Law and Justice
in the Courts of Classical Athens
[Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006], 142–47). “Corrupting the young” is understood as “persuading them to obey yourself rather than the fathers who bore them” at Xenophon,
Apology
39.

4.
Daimonion
as voice: Plato,
Apology
31d,
Phaedrus
242c; as sign: Plato,
Apology
40b,
Phaedrus
242b. Philosophers have debated whether the
daimonion
compromised Socrates’s commitment to rationality: see P. Destrée and N. D. Smith (eds.),
Socrates’ Divine Sign: Religion, Practice, and Value in Socratic Philosophy
(Kelowna, BC: Academic Printing and Publishing, 2005).

5.
For an attempt to reconstruct Socrates’s religious views see M. L. McPherran,
The Religion of Socrates
(University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996).

6.
For a general, if now rather dated introduction to Xenophon see J. Anderson,
Xenophon
(London: Duckworth, 1974).

7.
On what can be known about Plato’s life see for example J. Annas,
Plato: A Brief Insight
(New York: Sterling, 2003; ill. ed. 2009), 17–38. The ancient biographical tradition is analyzed (and found wanting) by A. Riginos,
Platonica: The Anecdotes Concerning the Life and Writings of Plato
(Leiden: Brill, 1976). Lucian:
True Stories
2.17.

8.
Xenophon,
Apology
1 argues that “others” have given grandiose versions of the speech, without communicating the substance. More generally on the instrumental power of stories of Socrates’s death see Wilson,
The Death of Socrates.
Evidence for Socrates’s thought also comes in the fragments of Aeschines the Socratic, but these are sparse.

9.
Doughnut: Bettany Hughes, personal conversation. Aristophanes in Plato’s
Apology,
19b–c. On the impossibility of recapturing the historical Socrates see A. Dorion, “The Rise and Fall of the Socratic Problem,” in Morrison,
The Cambridge Companion to Socrates,
1–23.

10.
For the view of the historical Socrates as an ethical philosopher see especially G. Vlastos,
Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991) and
Socratic Studies
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). Xenophon:
Memorabilia
1.1–4, also discussed in chapter 9.

11.
Plato,
Apology
26b–26e.

12.
M. F. Burnyeat, “The Impiety of Socrates,”
Ancient Philosophy
17 (1997): 1–12, reprinted in
Explorations in Ancient and Modern Philosophy,
vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 224–37. Oracle: Plato,
Apology
21a; quotation: 29d; mythological gods: Plato,
Euthyphro
6a–c.

13.
In general on Plato’s “theology” see L. Gerson,
God and Greek Philosophy: Studies in the Early History of Natural Theology
(London and New York: Routledge, 1990), 33–81. More generally on Plato: Annas,
Plato
and A. Mason,
Plato
(Durham: Acumen, 2010), who has lucid discussions of all of the Platonic ideas of forms, the soul, and the god. Plato’s dialogues do not present his ideas systematically; any “theory” has to be reconstructed from multiple sources. As a result, I refer at this point to secondary discussions, rather than to the original Platonic text.

14.
Second best, in contrast to
The Republic: Laws
739d–e. Generally on the
Laws
see C. Bobonich (ed.),
Plato’s Laws: A Critical Guide
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). On the religious aspects see R. Mayhew “The Theology of the
Laws,
” in Bobobich,
Plato’s Laws,
197–216. Mayhew’s translation and commentary upon
Laws
10 (
Plato, Laws 10
[Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008]) is also valuable.

15.
Three types of religious criminal:
Laws
885b. Atheist underground: D. Sedley, “The Atheist Underground,” in V. Harte and M. Lane (eds.),
Politeia in Greek and Roman Philosophy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 329–48.

16.
Punishments for insulting the gods:
Laws
885a–b; 907d–908a; 909d.